Lotus cars, a British Motor Vehicle company produced sports cars and racing cars. The company established since 1952 by Colin Chapman. Its headquartered located in Hethel, Norfolk, England, and U.K. The company CEO is Jean-Marc Gales and Aslam Farikullah is the COO of the company. It is a subsidiary of Chinese automotive company Geely.
Lotus cars include the “Esprit, Elan, Europa, Elise and Exige” sports cars and it had motor racing success with Team Lotus in Formula One. Lotus Cars is based at the former site of RAF Hethel, a World War II airfield in Norfolk. It also owns the manufacturing consultancy Lotus Engineering, which has facilities in the United Kingdom, United States, China, and Malaysia. Lotus was before owned by DRB-HICOM through its subsidiary Proton, in 1996. It got the following bankruptcy of former owner Romano Artioli.
Established
1952
Headquarters
Hethel, Norfolk, England,U.K.
History
In the middle of the logo four letters stand for the initials of company founder, Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman. When the logo was created, the first factory was placed in old stables behind the Railway Hotel in Hornsey, North London. Team Lotus, which was split off from Lotus Engineering in 1954, was active and competitive in Formula One racing from 1958 to 1994. The Lotus Group of Companies was formed in 1959. This was made up of Lotus Cars Limited and Lotus Components Limited. That focused on road cars and customer competition car production, respectively.
The company moved to a purpose built factory at Cheshunt in 1959. Lotus was notable for its use of fiberglass bodies, backbone chassis, and twin cam engines, initially supplied by Coventry Climax but later replaced by Lotus-Ford units (Ford block, Lotus head and valve gear). Lotus worked with Ford on the Lotus Cortina, a successful sports saloon.
More Information
The Lotus Seven, established in the 1950s as a simple, lightweight open two seater continued in production into the early 70s. Lotus then sold the rights to produce the Seven to Cater ham, which has continued to manufacture the car since then. By the mid 1970s, Lotus sought to move up market with the launch of the Elite and Eclat models, four seaters aimed at prosperous buyers, with features such as optional air conditioning and optional automatic transmissions.
The mid engined line continued with the Lotus Esprit. That was to prove one of the company’s longest lived and most iconic models. Lotus developed its own series of 4-cylinder DOHC engines. The Lotus 900 series, and later a V8, and turbocharged versions of the engines appeared in the Esprit.
Variants of the 900 series engine were supplied for the Jensen Healey sports car and the Sunbeam Lotus “hot hatchback”. Lotus cooperates with Vauxhall Motors to build the Lotus Carlton, the fastest road going Vauxhall car since 1980.
Operations
The Company also acts as an engineering consultancy, providing engineering development-especially of suspension-for other car manufacturers. Lotus’s powertrain department is answerable for the design and development of the 4-cylinder Ecotec engine originate in many of GM’s Vauxhall, Opel, Saab, Chevrolet and Saturn cars. The US Lotus Elise and Exige models use the 1.8L VVTL-i I4 from Toyota’s late Celica GT-S and the Matrix XRS which is no longer available new. The new Exige has the same V6 as the Evora and is not available in US as a road legal vehicle.
Michael Kimberley, who had been a guiding light at Lotus in the 1970s, returned and took over as acting chief executive officer of the Company and its Group from May 2006. He chaired the Executive Committee of Lotus Group International Limited (“LGIL”) established in February 2006, with Syed Zainal Abidin.
Lotus car models
1. Lotus Elise
2. Lotus Exige S
3. Lotus Evora
4. Lotus T125 Exos
Lotus Based Cars
- Infiniti Emerg-e Concept Car, based on Evora 414E.
- Rinspeed sQuba Concept Car, based on Elise chassis.
- Tesla Roadster, based on Elise chassis.
- Detroit Electric SP: 01, based on Elise chassis.
- Vauxhall VX220/Opel Speedster, based on the Elise.
- Melkus RS2000, based on Elise chassis.
- Hennessey Venom GT & GT2, based on Exige chassis.
Electric vehicles
Lotus Engineering has established a group dedicated to hybrid and electric vehicles. Lotus Engineering produced the Evora 414E as their first hybrid concept car. Its feature was a total hybrid range of more than 300 miles and 0-60 MPH in 4.4 seconds. Lotus connected with Jaguar Cars, MIRA Ltd. and Caparo on a luxury hybrid executive sedan project called “Limo-Green”-funded by the UK Government Technology Strategy Board.